task force

A state task force to help determine strategies for researching and mitigating harmful algae blooms met Thursday in St. Petersburg. It’s the first time the group has met since Gov. Ron DeSantis announced the initiative in November.

Jacksonville’s sea level rise task force has voted in favor of several more recommendations to submit to City Council before the temporary committee disbands later this month.

Southwest Florida is in some ways on the front lines of the global battle against harmful algal blooms. On yesterday’s show we met an ethnobotanist who has spent decades, along with his team of world class researchers, exploring the possible connections between the toxins produced by blue-green algae and neurodegenerative disorders like ALS and Alzheimer’s. He was in town attending a water summit because as he described it this part of Florida faced a “toxic vice” last year when the freshwater blue-green algae met the offshore red tide bloom in the Caloosahatchee estuary.

In the wake of last summer’s worst blue-green algae outbreak in Florida’s history, water management continues to be at the forefront of conversation in Florida. Now the state’s newly founded Blue-Green Algae Task Force has convened it’s first meeting. 

A new Florida task force met for the first time this week to start looking into transportation issues people with developmental and intellectual disabilities face on a daily basis. The Task Force on Transportation Disadvantaged Services was created as part of a new law that just took effect.

The man leading the fight against unscrupulous sober homes has a message for state legislators.

“When the appropriations process comes up, please keep us in mind,” said Palm Beach County State Attorney Dave Aronberg at a meeting with the Palm Beach County Legislative Delegation in Boca Raton Tuesday.

Aronberg leads the county’s Sober Home Task Force - created in July 2016 with a $275,000 appropriation from the state legislature.